Experiences of the Allied Servicemen who were Prisoners of War at Servigliano, Italy

I.S.9 Officers—Biography

Dr. Luigi Donfrancesco, nephew of I.S.9 “A” Force agent Andrea Scattini, has discovered a number of online sites that offer information on six key I.S.9 officers.

These officers—Andrew Robb (New Zealand), Richard W. B. Lewis (United States), Bridges George McGibbon-Lewis (UK), Major John Francis Fillingham (UK), Major John Alec McKee (UK), and Raymond Lee Couraud (France)—are mentioned frequently in the official I.S.9 history and in I.S.9 situation reports and war diaries on this site.

The men were active in I.S.9 No. 5 Field Section operations along the the Adriatic coastline of Italy.

Served in the Johore Volunteer Engineers (1932–1938) and the 1st Perak Battalion, Federation of Malay States Volunteers (1939–1942)

Served as Lieutenant, G Branch, Land Headquarters, Australian Intelligence Corps (1942–1944)

Commissioned on May 14, 1945, General List (emergency commission)

Retired to Christchurch, New Zealand with his wife, Antonina, where he worked as a surveyor

Died December 1974

Captain Richard Warrington Baldwin Lewis

Born November 1, 1917, in Chicago, Illinois

Active in the Middle East, North Africa, and Italy

Served in the American military intelligence service operated out of Washington, D.C. known as M.I.S.(X), which partnered with British M.I.9 in I.S.9 Central Mediterranean Forces activities

Was a commanding officer of the Northern Italy War Crimes Investigation Team

Received a Legion of Merit Award in 1944 for service behind enemy lines

Discharged from service in 1946 with the rank of major

Was a visiting lecturer at Smith College (1951–1952), a resident fellow at Princeton University (1952–1954), and faculty member at Rutgers University until appointment to the Yale University faculty in 1959

At Yale, taught in the Departments of English and American Studies

Was considered an authority on the development of the American novel in the 19th and 20th centuries

His Edith Wharton: A Biography won a Pulitzer Prize in 1976

Retired from Yale in 1988

At the time of his death on June 13, 2002, he was survived by Nancy Lewis, his wife of 52 years, and their son and two daughters

In June 1941, escaped from Crete aboard an abandoned landing craft; was taken POW by the Italian submarine Adua, which intercepted the landing craft; escaped after being landed in Italy and fought with the partisans

On September 17, 1944 was transferred to the Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment, Army Air Corps (served through January 1, 1946)

Lieutenant (1941), served with 4th Indian Division, Western Desert, 1941–1942

Was a prisoner of war in Libya; escaped in 1942

Member of I.S.9 “A” Force, special unit involved in escape operations in the Western Desert (1942), Italy (1943–1944), and Austria (1945)

Promoted to captain in 1945, and to major in 1950

Died in 1981

Captain Raymond Lee (Couraud)

French, naturalized British

Raymond Couraud (aka Lee) born in France on January 12, 1920

Was age 18 when he enrolled in the French Foreign Legion in 1938
(To be enrolled in the Foreign Legion one needed to be at least 21, so Raymond Lee Couraud lied about his date and place of birth, saying he was born four years earlier in Belgium.)

Assigned to the French Forces’ 5th Company of the 13th Brigade in March 1940

In Marseilles, in 1941, he assisted in the rescue of scores of artistic and intellectual refugees who sought to escape from the Nazi threat

In England, joined the Special Operations Executive of the French Free Forces; later served in the second regiment of the Special Air Service (SAS), and then commanded the newly formed French Squadron of the 2nd SAS